Hello, Agnes!

This is little blind Agnes, who arrived a few weeks ago from an Indiana animal shelter. Agnes had ended up there after her owner was incarcerated and various pets were impounded, including her. The shelter manager who contacted us about Agnes said she was the sweetest girl and hoped we’d be able to take her in.

About a week later, our professional pet transportation company, Royal Paws, picked up Agnes and brought her out to us in New Hampshire.

The photo makes her look bigger than she is in reality — she’s only 9 pounds. And yes, she is an absolute doll — a real sweetheart. She can’t see a thing, and although she can hear, she can’t get a fix on where sound is coming from. This means she frequently is spinning around, trying to echolocate the source of the sound. We generally just touch her when we talk to her so she knows where we are.

For an old girl — the shelter estimated her age at 12 to 14 years old — Agnes has a surprising amount of energy. And she’s either “on” or “off” — when she’s “on,” she’s zooming around the house, exploring everything, checking out the other dogs, seeing where Alayne and I are. Just a whirlwind of activity.

When she’s “off,” she’s completely conked out and  sleeps soundly in her bed in the kitchen:

Today she figured out how to jump onto a chair in the living room to snooze. Of course, given her blindness and tiny size, we now have to worry about Agnes trying to jump off that chair, so we’re setting up a doggie ramp so she can come and go as she pleases. (At some point she’s going to find out that our blind Foxhound Winnie also likes the same chair, but I think there’s room enough for both.)

Alayne’s already taken Agnes to our primary care vet for a complete work-up, and she’s in remarkably good shape for a senior. We’re always looking for those “uh oh” results in blood work when they are this age and coming to us with an unknown health history. We were pleasantly surprised with the findings from her CBC and chemistry panels.

But her mouth is a total wreck. It might be the worst we’ve seen in all these years of doing this — and that’s saying a lot! So we have her scheduled with our board-certified veterinary dentist/oral surgeon in Burlington for a full dental in a few weeks, which I expect will involve a lot of extractions. (We’re on a cancellation list so if we can get her in sooner, we will.)

Agnes is blind from cataracts in both eyes, but my hunch is there’s more going on than just cataracts (there’s often more than one eye disease/problem occurring). She’ll also be seeing our ophthalmologist in Burlington for an eye exam.

In the meantime, this adorable little girl is enjoying her new start in life. We’re grateful to the shelter in Indiana for giving her that second chance with us.

Oh … and yes, she does love having her tummy rubbed!